by Maya Angelou
“Bail, I’ve come here to get you. Let’s go,” I said.
He raised up a little. “My, this is not your role. I am the big brother. You don’t come down and get me.”
I said, “Somebody has to do it. If not me, who?”
“Nobody. This is my life. I want you to go home.”
“I don’t want to leave you here. Next thing you’ll be in jail and who wants to go to jail?”
“Your mother said jail was made for people, not horses. Jail does not frighten me.”
I saw I was losing the conversation, if in fact I had not already lost it altogether. I put more urgency in my voice. “Bailey, I don’t want to leave you here. Anything can happen.”
He said, “And it probably will. You get up and go home to your son. I’m not doing too many bad things. I’m a fence. I sell hot goods to people who want bargains. I’m not hurting anybody but myself. Get up and go now. I don’t want these people to see too much of you.”
I started to cry.
He said, “For God’s sake, don’t whine. You can’t change me, but you can change you. Get on and go home.” He stood up. “Now.”
I joined him.
“I’ll take you to your car,” he said. “Let’s go.”
As usual, I obeyed. Outside on the steps he spoke to the two doormen. Bailey said, “This is my sister and she won’t be back.”
The men murmured and their behavior told me that Bailey was in charge.
At the car he said, “Stop worrying about me. Your mother understands that this is my life and I will live it as I see fit.”
Later, when I spoke to Mother about Bailey, she said, “Bailey has his own life. He’s never forgiven me for sending you all to Arkansas. I’m sorry that he can’t let that go. But I did the best I knew to do and I can’t undo history.”
Bailey met a girl who looked like Mother. She was pretty and, more important, she had a snappy personality. She spoke loudly and laughed often. His marriage to Eunice was his lifesaver. They moved to Hawaii and he was able to live a life so clean and normal that upon looking at him, it was hard to believe he had ever been a drug addict.
The couple took up tennis seriously and hiking as a pastime. But Bailey’s marriage was cut short by Eunice’s unexpected death. My brother lost his tenuous hold on sanity. He went to the funeral wearing his tennis whites and carrying two tennis rackets. He went to the open casket and laid one racket over her body. Within a week, Bailey had disappeared again into the greedy maw of the drug world.
Vivian gave me all she had to give me. Her son Bailey had disappointed her. She thought that since his father had not accepted the chance to teach, to guide his manhood, she would do it. She didn’t consider that as a woman she could not possibly be a man, that as a mother she was unable to be a father.
She ladled the syrup of motherhood love on him. She told him that although he was a Johnson, the most important genes in his body were those he inherited from his mother. He was a Baxter.
Bailey adored her but he was unable to always forgive her for sending him away. He could not banish the memory of the lonely Arkansas years, when he never felt at home. He was five years old when we reached the country roads and quiet, nearly bare rooms of Arkansas.
Perhaps his young years had held on to the sound of loud laughter and music and arguments, which he had heard in his infancy.
Grandmother’s store and even the loud singing in the Sunday church could not drown out his mother’s voice.
“[Bailey] saw his mother, his home, and then all his lonely birthdays were gone. His nights when scary things made noise under the bed were forgotten.”
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The telephone call had brought me across the country to my mother’s hospital bed. Although she was a pale, ashen color and her eyes didn’t want to stay focused, she smiled to see me.
With a little voice she said, “Baby, I knew you would come.”
I kissed her dry lips and said, “I’m here. Everything will be okay.” Although I didn’t believe that, I said it because that was the only thing to say.
Her smile was even but she tried to show that she also believed me. After a short visit, during which I did all the talking, I went to confer with her doctors. Their prognosis was unpromising. Mother’s ailment was lung cancer along with emphysema and they estimated that she might have at most three months to live.
I knew she would live better in North Carolina because I would be at her side and would make her as comfortable as possible. When I asked her, “Would you come to North Carolina and let me take care of you?” she brightened up and whispered, “Yes.”
Rosa Faye, my brother’s firstborn, agreed to travel with Mother to Winston-Salem. I returned to North Carolina to prepare. I had a large, bright room painted a pale pink, complemented by colorful floral draperies. The room was cheerful and welcoming and I hung paintings and family photographs.
When the car arrived bringing my mother and Rosa, Mother was so weak she was unable to walk or even stand. The driver picked her up and brought her into the house carrying her in his arms. I embraced her and led the driver to her room. Mother sat on the side of the bed and looked around me, then gave me a wide smile. She said, “Baby, it’s beautiful. You decorated for me, didn’t you?”
I said, “Yes. How did you know? Do you smell the paint?”
“Yes, a little, but that doesn’t bother me. You painted it pink because you know I love pink. I am going to get well here,” she said.
Her statement was not weak with hopefulness; it was strong with certainty. The doctors who were awaiting her arrival entered her room and closed the door. We waited nervously for their findings. The doctors joined me at my kitchen table while Rosa made Mother comfortable. They said, “We read her California doctors’ records and we need to examine her at our hospital. Bring her in tomorrow.”
The North Carolina doctors discontinued chemotherapy and instead prescribed a therapy of radiology. Mother’s spirits rose every day. After a week she called me to her room and asked me to help her out of her gown.
“You’ve always been fond of art. Now look at your mother.” The radiologists had painted her bust and back with bright red and yellow paint. “Do I remind you of Picasso?” she asked.
I was happy to laugh with her and to know that although she was not healed, she had chosen to be better. After two months, one of the physicians, Dr. Imamura, said there was no explanation for her recovery. Salt-and-pepper hair began to grow on her bald head. She had enough appetite to ask for substantial food and even to offer to cook it for herself. Within six months she gained weight and strength. She began entertaining friends and went with me to church.
With Mother’s steady improvement, I was encouraged to return to my work, which was lecturing around the country. Mother asked if I would send for her closest friend, Aunt Area, and I said yes.
She asked, “Isn’t it time for you to do the work that you have to do?”
I said, “Yes.”
She said, “Then you’d better do it.”
My two housekeepers were massive women of height and girth. Ms. Knowles, who lived in, was six feet two and weighed 275 pounds. Mrs. Sterling, who came daily, was five ten and about two hundred pounds. Mother treated them as if they were her little girls. They loved it and behaved accordingly.
Aunt Area arrived and right away I wished I had sent for her earlier. She and my mother laughed and giggled and my house was wonderful to be in, totally free of the fear and apprehension that had filled it before. Mother was comfortable and happy. Each time I packed to leave, I noticed a kind of holiday spirit in the air. My mother would hold my hand and kiss my cheeks.
“Oh baby, Mother is going to miss you. You have a good time and come back soon. Mother needs you,” she would say.
The car taking me to the airport would be hardly out of the driveway when my mother would call all my employees from the office and the house and inform them that she and Aunt Area were taking them to lunch at a local
seafood restaurant. She had booked a limo for her and Aunt Area. “Get ready. Let’s go and let’s eat.”
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An invitation arrived that stunned and thrilled me. England’s University of Exeter invited me to come and teach for three weeks in their hallowed halls as distinguished visiting professor. I thanked the administrator but said no, I couldn’t leave North Carolina, because my mother was gravely ill.
When Vivian Baxter heard that I had rejected the invitation, she called me to her room. “Go,” she whispered. “Go. Show them you spell your name W-O-M-A-N. I’ll be here when you get back!”
I left North Carolina and began lecturing at the Exeter campus. I telephoned each day to check on my mother’s recovery.
One day Guy called and told me, “Mom, Grandmother is not pleased with Aunt Area.”
“Why not?”
Guy said, “Aunt Area wants to put the sides up around Grandmother’s bed, and she disagrees. She wants to spend her time sitting up on the side of the bed.”
“You’ve been a hard worker—white, black, Asian, and Latino women ship out of the San Francisco port because of you.
You have been a shipfitter, a nurse, a real estate broker, and a barber.
Many men and—if my memory serves me right—a few women risked their lives to love you. There has never been anyone greater than you.”
I telephoned Mom. “Mother?”
She whispered, “Yes, baby.”
“Would you like me to send Aunt Area back to California?”
She nearly shouted, “Yes.”
I told her I would send her back the next day.
She hummed her gratitude.
I asked my secretary to have a large check cut and to deliver it to Aunt Area the next day at one o’clock.
I telephoned Auntie at 12:50 P.M. “Auntie, thank you for coming to see after Mother. I appreciate that.”
She said, “She’s my sister. I had to do it.”
“Now Auntie, it’s time for you to go home. She needs to live her life on her own terms. I’m told that you don’t want to allow her to sit on the side of her bed.”
“That’s right. She is sick. She could fall off the bed.”
I said, “Auntie, she is dying of lung cancer. So what if she wants to sit on the side of her bed? I’m going to give you something to thank you for coming to see about her.”
“You can’t pay me for looking after my sister.”
At that moment, my secretary entered the room and laid the check down in front of Aunt Area. She read it and melted. “Oh, Maya, baby, thank you. I love you and I love your mother. I will go back to California and keep my sister in my prayers.”
Two days later, I decided to leave Exeter for home. I was picked up at the Greensboro, North Carolina, airport and taken to my mother’s hospital room.
Vivian Baxter was in a coma. I spoke to her anyway. Her hand lay in mine without movement.
The next day I hired three women to sit with her in shifts of eight hours each.
“You don’t have to nurse her. There are nurses here to do that. I only want you to hold her hand. If you have to go to the toilet, let someone else hold her hand until you return. I want her to have human contact as long as she is alive.”
On the third day after I returned, I went to visit Mother. I took her hand and said, “I’ve been told some people need to be given permission to leave. I don’t know if you are waiting, but I can say you may have done all you came here to do.
“You’ve been a hard worker—white, black, Asian, and Latino women ship out of the San Francisco port because of you. You have been a shipfitter, a nurse, a real estate broker, and a barber. Many men and—if my memory serves me right—a few women risked their lives to love you. You were a terrible mother of small children, but there has never been anyone greater than you as a mother of a young adult.”
She squeezed my hand twice.
I kissed her fingers and gave them back to the woman sitting beside her bed. Then I went home.
I awakened at dawn and raced downstairs in my pajamas. I drove to the hospital and doubled-parked my car. I didn’t wait for the elevators. I ran up the stairs to her floor.
The nurse said, “She just left.”
I looked at my mother’s lifeless form and thought about her passion and wit. I knew she deserved a daughter who loved her and had a good memory, and she got one.
Like her daughter, “Lady B” was noted as a great storyteller and served as founder and president of the Stockton Black Women of Humanity, which provided scholarships to black high school students. She was also an active member of a Masonic order, a past chairwoman of Concerned Women for Political Action, and a board member of the United Way, San Joaquin County Blind Center, Women’s Center of Stockton, and Board of Directors of Gemini, Inc.
The City of Stockton takes pride and pleasure in naming this park site today in memory of Vivian “Lady B” Baxter, a woman who devoted her life to help anyone in need.
NAMING OF PARK SITE, MARCH 4, 1995
I give particular thanks to Vivian Baxter, who generously taught me how to be a mother, allowing me to dedicate this book to one of the most courageous and generous men I know, my son, Guy Bailey Johnson.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
To all parents who have dared to raise daughters and sons with love, laughter, and prayers.
Who have stumbled and fallen, and yet arisen and gone on to be successful mothers and fathers.
And to all whom I have kept under a mother’s watchful eye:
Oprah, Stephanie Johnson, Lydia Stuckey,
Valerie Simpson, Bettie Clay, Ceda Floyd,
Dinky Weber, Jacqui Sales, and others,
you know who you are.
I thank God, and I thank you.
BY MAYA ANGELOU
AUTOBIOGRAPHY
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
Gather Together in My Name
Singin’ and Swingin’ and Gettin’
Merry Like Christmas
The Heart of a Woman
All God’s Children Need
Traveling Shoes
A Song Flung Up to Heaven
Mom & Me & Mom
ESSAYS
Wouldn’t Take Nothing for My
Journey Now
Even the Stars Look Lonesome
Letter to My Daughter
POETRY
Just Give Me a Cool Drink of Water ’fore I Diiie
Oh Pray My Wings Are Gonna Fit
Me Well
And Still I Rise
Shaker, Why Don’t You Sing?
I Shall Not Be Moved
On the Pulse of Morning
Phenomenal Woman
The Complete Collected Poems of
Maya Angelou
A Brave and Startling Truth
Amazing Peace
Mother
Celebrations
CHILDREN’S BOOKS
Poetry for Young People
My Painted House, My Friendly
Chicken, and Me
Kofi and His Magic
MAYA’S WORLD SERIES
Angelina of Italy
Izak of Lapland
Mikale of Hawaii
Renée Marie of France
PICTURE BOOKS
Love’s Exquisite Freedom
Now Sheba Sings the Song
Life Doesn’t Frighten Me
COOKBOOKS
Great Food, All Day Long
Hallelujah! The Welcome Table
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Poet, writer, performer, teacher, and director MAYA ANGELOU was raised in Stamps, Arkansas, and then went to San Francisco. In addition to her bestselling autobiographies, beginning with I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, she has written five poetry collections, including I Shall Not Be Moved and Shaker, Why Don’t You Sing?, and two cookbooks, Hallelujah! The Welcome Table and Great Food, All Day Long, as well as the celebrated poem “On the Pulse of Morning,” which she read at the inauguration of President Wi
lliam Jefferson Clinton, and “A Brave and Startling Truth,” written at the request of the United Nations and read at its fiftieth anniversary. She lives in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.